1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an apparatus and method for collating belt loops to match their shade with the shade of a garment to which they are to be sewn and for rolling the collated belt loops into bundles for storage and subsequent use.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In my copending patent application, Ser. No. 587,743, filed June 17, 1975, and entitled "Apparatus and Method for Forming Belt Loops", an apparatus and method for making belt loops from discrete, pre-sized plies of fabric material is disclosed in detail. Specifically, belt loops are cut from fabric plies used to form garment pieces in the exact size of the finished loop to leave as little waste between the garment pieces on the fabric plies, as possible. Each loop ply cut from the fabric is aligned with a folder by pneumatic jets, and transported to the folder by a ram which positions the aligned ply on the conveyor belt feeding the folder. The longitudinal edges of the loop ply are overlapped by the folder along their length. The folded ply is then fed to a sewing means positioned to form stitches over the exposed overlapped edge along its entire length while the alignment is retained. Succeeding loop plies are fed through the folder and sewn in a chain of belt loops after they have been folded. The chain of closely spaced loops are then wound onto a reel.
By using this technique, the small individual belt loops may be nested among the larger parts in a garment pattern in such a way that the belt loops are formed from fabric which would otherwise be wasted. A significant cost savings of material is realized by providing loop pieces cut to the exact length and width without wastage of fabric.
It is most desirable to collate the belt loops cut from a particular garment pattern with the larger pattern pieces cut from the same location on the pattern. The color or shade of the fabric material will differ at different portions of the same fabric from which the garment parts are cut. Therefore, belt loops cut from an area adjacent to other components of the same garment should be used with those components when sewing the complete garment. Otherwise, there may be a significant difference in color in the "shading" of the belt loops and other garment components.
Heretofore, belt loops were "shaded" or collated with adjacent garment components cut from the same fabric lay by placing a mark on the loop plies corresponding to the position of the garment components on the pattern adjacent to which they were cut. The marked plies after being formed into belt loops were accumulated and separated according to their markings and placed into a receptacle having compartments corresponding to each garment position on the pattern. When the time came to sew the completed garment, the loops corresponding to the larger components were removed from the corresponding receptacle compartment for use with the larger components. Obviously, this is a tedious and time-consuming manual chore.
The present invention provides an apparatus and method for automatically collating and bundling the chains of belt loops formed in accordance with my material saving technique to correspond them to garment components which are cut from an adjacent area on a garment pattern. The loops are cut from adjacent areas on a fabric as the larger garment components and are kept in the same order as the garment components throughout the belt-loop forming process.